Post a photo of your crane!
 

This has probably been done, but i've searched and can't really find a thread dedicated to cranes.

I've recently built my own crane. Soon I will have pictures. But for now i'd like to see what everyone else is working with. It'll be fun.

I'm particularly interested in cranes on dolly tracks. I'm hoping to build a dolly that my jib will attach to. Anyone done this? or atleast know a good pic of one?

As soon as I get mine back, I'll set it up and snap a few pics for you.

Sounds good!

As soon as I"m allowed to post attachments, I will too!

Ok, here's my set up. It's the Pro Am 250 with the optional extra 4' section. I didn't install the piece when I took the shots. But it booms out 12'! The only mods I've made so far is a tension wire that runs front to back. With my XL1 mounted on it, the 250 tended to sag when lifting. So I just made a new extension for the fulcrum and added eye bolts to the ends. I also made a little are to hold my monitor.

As you can tell I built the dolly myself with 3/4 or 1" ply. I had my friend weld up the wheel chassis, and push bar/yoke. The hardest part was drilling the holes for the axles.

The bearings are abec 5 and they're not to noisy. Running on 1 1/2" pvc we encountered a whirring sound. So I made the track ends out of aluminum diamond plate and 1 1/2" ABS test plugs. I found when you plug the ends of the pipe, it really makes the noise level drop. Plus it helps keep the pipe lined up and gives me a solid stop point.

James

Here's m DIY jib.

Bill

Hey Bill, What are those things that look like screw drivers handles. Is it some sort of parking brake?

James,

No, I hold the jib to the dolly with clamps, those are the clamp handels.

Bill

Nice crane guys!

Mine is still not finished. I've got to build the dolly and the tripod that it will sit on. It looks almost exactly like the Kessler crane.

Pics up soon I hope.

I have a question for you. I am absolutely new to film and am teaching myself everything so excuse bassic questions.

Once I build the crane, I will need a monitor and a cable that connects from the camera to the monitor. What do you guys suggest??

I am simply asuming that I will only need a monitor and a cable. If I am missing something please let me know.

When I have an outlet available I use a 13" Sony monitor if not I use a 7" Varizoom monitor with battary power.

Bill

my jib pic
 

Here is my 21 foot JonyJib. We did a series of "fly arounds" with this Chevy dealer. Looks great!

Bill - i'm probably going to need something with battery power. I will be working on an archaeological site in an area where an outlet will be to far away. Any recomendations on a battery powered monitor would be great. I am totaly unaware of my options at the moment as I am just getting into the whole filming thing... One wouldn't suspect so given that i've already built my own crane without first owning a camera.. My camera choice has been the XH A1 (like so many others..) simply because of the nature of my filming needs. I plan to film a documentary that includes both actor recreations and documentary style filming of archaeologists working in their respective field. I built the crane so that I could get an arial view of both temporal time frames (prehisoric life and contemporary historians).

If you or someone could give me an idea of what I will need in terms of battery powered monitor, what cables I will need to run from the camera to the monitor, sun shade...etc. I would be very appreciative.


thank you for your time.
Great posts everyone...especially the white crane :)

-Terry.

Hi Terry, I'm also intending to build something like yr crane.. could u comment on how the bearings were done for the pivot bracket?

muh crane
 

Here are some very unflattering pictures of my crane. It rides on a modified matthews doorway dolly. Max height is only about 12 feet, but since it can fly 2 people on it, there are a lot of fun things you can do. In the second photo ignore the tall grass that i was lax in mowing... and thats an upsidedown wheelbarrow next to the crane, not part of it. Orange strap on crane is just what i use to lift it in and out of the truck. (swing crane in the truck cranes the crane, so i can load/unload/build it by myself.

crazy, eh?

Sean - I was lucky enough to find a bearing big enough to support my crane and worked around it.

Like the Kessler crane, there are two flat bars that support both the crane on the tripod and the camera on the arm. I simply attached the bearing to the bottom of the flat bar facing the tripod and it works great.

Try to find a scrap metal junk yard. Normally industral junk yards will have all sorts of stuff like that. But good luck finding one that will come off easy :) Bring a hammer...

Andrew - That crane is pretty crazy. I would have never thought to hoist the camera operator into the air.. But I imagine that gives you several advantages in omnidirectional rotation.

Do you normally have a tripod on that platform or do they just hold the cameras?

Terry,

This is the one I use it is low res I use it just for framing.
http://varizoom.com/products/monitors/vztft7.html

Another that I considered.
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...Mountable.html

Bill

crazy crane
 

Heya Terry,

Its funny that a ride-on crane would be so unthinkable. I mean, I know where you are coming from, but from a historical perspective, NOT putting the cameraman on the end of the crane is a relatively recent thing.

Te old hollywood crane had two, sometimes 3 seats on it. One for the cameraman, one for the focus puller and sometimes even one for the director. If you've seen a movie made before 1990, you've seen the results of a ride-on crane. And even since then, they still have a place. I bought my crane off a professional grip who last used it for a couple second unit shots on King Kong... go figure.

There is a center column, like a fixed "bazooka" mount that has a euroboss connector on the top. Originally that would have been connected to a 150mm bowl adapter (film rigs can be CRAZY heavy), but I had a 75mm bowl adapter machined so i could use my lowly miller ds10 head on it. Basically your seats pivot around a center column where the camera is mounted. There is something really tactile and nice about being with the camera as it moves around. You certainly have more freedom to improvise and to see shots out of the corner of your eye that you cant with a robot crane. The downside is that it takes at least 2 people to operate, ideally 3+. We've been playing around with the camerman holding a steadicam merlin. That adds even more organic control, but of course a whole nother level of complexity.

In the end, having a giant crazy crane isnt the most practical for industrial videos. (although i still use it for that.) My main goal in purchasing the crane... well, my main goal was to get the matthews dolly. The crane was almost a freebie on top of the price of the dolly, but anyways, my main goal was to do wannabe indy films. And frankly, I think wannabe indy films are more fun with a bunch of people hands on and some danger involved. hehe.

The nicest thing about a ride-on crane... inertia. once you get it going, its a big heavy balanced thing that wants to be very smooth. Its almost impossible to make a shot jerky or bouncy when you have that much weight involved. Yay physics!

cheers,
-a

Made this Lightweight crane for my HV20
 

I just fashioned this light weight crane/jib that will extent about 12 to 13 feet last weekend, for use with a light camera and perhaps Letusadapter.
Uses a heavy umbrella stand as base, upright is piece of sewer pipe over an umbrella poll. On the cap at end of sewer pipe, I mount a caster swivvel from about a 5 inch caster wheel. Took the wheel out, but actually used it as a friction device for the camera up and down direction adjustment. Bought u- brackets and some hardware from Home Depot to mount the swivvel and the camera up/down adjuster.

Made boom from aluminum tubing. Everything is sitting in picture, on a standard cheap handtruck/dolly truck..

ooh could I bother u to include a closeup photo?? I cant figure it out very well.. thanks for the help!

I imagine it will be difficult to use a Letus adapter on a crane. You will have to build a support platform long enough to accomodate for the support rods holding the Letus.

I've noticed everyone has tires instead of a track. I would assume that this would make the entire crane wobbly. What are your comments?

As soon as I visit the people building the crane, I will take a pic of the entire crane and a close up of the bearings to post.

Andrew - you are ofcorse right. Thank you for the information. I actually do not know much about film. I am just starting and have little knowledge of its history. I have been an anthropology student for 5 years with no experience with a camera other than a little home movie camera..

You said something about the crane's weight. Would it be ideal to have a heavy crane? Talking in terms of the actual crane arm itself or the track in which it is mounted to?

First, I did not envision shooting while moving the crane. But I will try some tests this weekend to see what it does. My intentions was that this be for a stationary shots, and mount on dolly was only for easy of moving. That umbrella stand is very heavy.

As to Letus, I use the 35a. It can be shot without rods, though I will have no problem adding a lightweight support for it from scrap aluminum....

heavy crane
 

heh. Well. Thats a bit subjective.

I think during a shot, it is ideal to have a really heavy crane and arm and track. However, all the time leading up to the start of the shot and immediately after you stop recording, you want the crane and track to be as light and small as possible. hehe.

Its all relative, really. If you have a lightweight pocket crane then you wont mind carrying up to a shoot on a 3rd floor. With my 300lb crane, you are either gonna have to come up with a ton of money or a freight elevator for me to drag it up to the top. There is probably some sweet spot between my heavyass crane and some flimsy jiggle crane where its transportable yet stable.

But again, my crane is more of a fun/hobby thing than anything else.

Here's my DIY 2x2 pine crane on a skater dolly we built from the DJTV plans ( http://www.digitaljuice.com/djtv/seg...searchid=30594 ). As you can see, it's being steered with a pinky :) I stabilized the footage as it was taken with a Point and Shoot digital still cam...didn't bother zooming in to hide the black edges though:

http://www.yafiunderground.com/Video/dollycrane-sm.mov

Here's a video of how the crane was put together...I've since replaced the tripod with an old samson tripod and a lazy susan bearing:

http://www.yafiunderground.com/Video/BTS_Crane.mp4

A few pictures of our crane... Cammate 2000 series. Simply Awesome.

http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...1/IMGP4512.jpg
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...1/IMGP7479.jpg
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...1/IMGP4152.jpg
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...1/IMGP3508.jpg
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...1/IMGP3400.jpg
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...1/IMGP3374.jpg

How much was everything including taxes?

nearsightedproductions.com

Here's a video clip of a few jib shots throw together from a commercial:

http://www.ytvweddingvideos.co.uk/JI...rane_Shots.mov

The final commercial is on the client's site: http://www.mothershiptonscave.com/media.html

It's a Hague multi jub with a varizoom PT head on a Vinten Pro10, lots of modding and add ons to get it all running. Runs off batteries or mains.

Here is my Jimmy Jib Lite
 

I have two jibs the lite is the one pictured on my website kyvideoservices.com but I also have a 8' Jimmy Jib1 with a Varizoom remote control head.

James Stone... is the Pro Am 250 stand basically this but for more money?

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/400164-REG/

Also are you happy with the product and service?

Hey Travis,

It looks pretty close. I wish I had seen a better picture on the website before I bought it from them. I could have bought the same thing from the local DJ shop for a lot less.

If you have any other questions just ask.

James

James: How do you like the Pro Am crane? I've been the site and they seem good for the amount of money. I was curious how they hold up?

Hey Travis, We bought the 250 with the three 4' extensions for it. When we had it at 8' it was pretty solid with an XL1. But if we had it at the full 12' it seemed to sag a little. So when you boom up you had to compensate for the delay.

To counter this, I made some adjustments to it. I mounted three eye bolts to it. one on each end and one in the middle to string a tension line. This really helped out a lot. It doesn't sag and it handles better.

The tilt arm takes some getting used to, but with practice it's manageable.

The only real disappointment is with the tripod they offer. You can't adjust the legs individually. It's just a plain PA speaker tripod. If you want it relatively level you're gonna have to shim it up. If you want it I can take some snap shots of it set up so you can see some of the details.

James

Thanks James, I would really appreciate some close ups of your rig and what changes you made.

Ok let me see what I can do.

Thanks James looking forward to it.

Hi, James Stone. I'm seriously looking into getting a crane/jib. I am trying to decide if I should get the ProAm crane you have, or shell out more money and get a Kessler crane. I've heard how great the Kessler is, but money is a factor, so I'm wondering whether or not the ProAm would be a good, cheaper alternative.
I've been looking around the internet and have only gotten a few small glimpses of shots done with the ProAm, and not much information to go by.
How smooth do the shots look? Is it really hard to get a smooth looking shot with the camera position set on manual, as I've heard a few people complain about? I'd appreciate any advice/experience you could share regarding the ProAm.